I chose my words carefully and spoke as if I were asking for Rae’s advice, not disputing her. Because despite Rae’s valid disdain for me, I knew she could be reasonable. She cared about October, and I had to trust that her decision would ultimately be based on that.

“Are you sure about what October would want you to do?” I asked. “It’s highly possible you know better than I do what she wants now. But please be honest about it. If you can say with complete certainty that she would want you to kick me out of this line and send me on my way, I’ll go.” My voice was shaky, my mouth dry. I needed water. Most of the people in line had water with them. I was an amateur art aficionado. I cleared my throat and continued. “But if you think there’s even a small chance she might not want you to do that, then you have to let me in, and you know it.”

I could see her weighing my logic alongside her aversion.

Yanmei’s hands were tiny, like October’s, and she was pressing them, palms down, to her chest, one on top of the other like a lowercase “x.” I think she recognized my good intentions and was rooting for me.

Jessie mumbled, “I vote to let the guy in.”

Rae shot him another shut-up-or-die look and then glared at me with scathing hostility. And she mulled over my appeal for so long the line had to move on without me. Jessie walked by and I became number fifty-eight. The two women behind him apologized and did the same. Fifty-nine. Sixty.

Rae’s face was a swarm of bees, buzzing, ready to attack.

“Rae . . .”

She gripped her hips, her elbows pointing out at sharp angles, even through her jacket. Her clothes were so boxy she looked like a child puppet about to break into a dance.

A little guy in a Chicago Cubs jacket walked around me. Sixty-one.

“Rae . . .” I begged one last time.

She exhaled with fury. Then she spun on all points of her feet and stomped back up the stairs in her big black boots, fuming and mumbling to herself.

It wasn’t until she was gone that I heard the music playing in the room, the volume so low it was scarcely perceptible. I hadn’t noticed it amid all the drama, but there it was. The same song, on a loop.

I don’t wanna get over you—

Chapter 27

TWENTY-SEVEN.

I squinted at the shattered glass house with Yanmei inside, trying to make out how the experience was going for her. All I could see were blurry, broken up shapes at a table.